What Is On-Page SEO?

Date First Published: 27th October 2022

Topic: Web Design & Development

Subtopic: SEO

Article Type: Computer Terms & Definitions

Difficulty Level: 6/10

Learn more about what on-page SEO is in this article.

On-page SEO, also known as on-site SEO, or on-page optimisation refers to ways of improving the position of a website in the search results directly within the website that website owners have control over. It is the opposite of off-page SEO which refers to ways of improving the position of a website in the search results outside of the website that website owners have little control over, such as the quantity and quality of external websites that link to it. Both types of SEO are equally important, but it is recommended to focus on on-page SEO first before focusing on off-page SEO.

On-page SEO refers to optimising individual webpages for search engines and it is important because it helps search engines to have an understanding of the content and identify whether it is relevant to the searcher's query. Because the on-page elements are what users engage with, it is important that the on-page SEO of a website works well. According to Google, "The most basic signal that information is relevant is when content contains the same keywords as your search query". The main goal of on-page SEO is to optimise the content, design, and format of a page to rank higher in the SERPs in order to increase organic website traffic. For more information on how to optimise web content for on-page SEO, see this article.

Elements Of On-Page SEO

Elements of on-page SEO include:

• Title tags
• Meta descriptions
• Meta keywords tags
• Alt attributes
• Images
• HTML code
• URL optimisation
• HTML heading tags, such as <h1> and <h2>.
• Error pages
• Sitemaps
• High-quality web content
• Keyword placement and density
• Internal links
• Server availability and response time
• Mobile friendliness